Letters to the editor: ‘O Buccaneers’

Published: October 11, 2013

‘O Buccaneers’

With a deep complimentary allusion to Willa Cather’s wonderful book “O Pioneers,” a book that touches on the benefits of honest and wise efforts toward achieving a treasured goal, I now segue into my humble effort — to shine a light on the energies of somewhat dimmer precepts. And I call my effort “O Buccaneers”.

I begin by taking a stroll down memory lane. Remember Doug Williams? Cast off too quickly! Doug then led the Washington Redskins to capture a dramatic Super Bowl soon afterwards. Remember Tony Dungy, who with serene dignity formed the very Tampa team that captured the same crown after his departure? And then Dungy won the ultimate prize soon after with his new team in Indianapolis.

The spirit of self-congratulatory “crowning” by Buc management while utilizing Dungy’s product seemed to me back then a bit disingenuous. But now the “crow” has slowly morphed into Edgar Allan Poe’s foreboding “The Raven.” And now his raven sadly sits upon his perch atop the press box in ol’ Tampa Town — repeating and repeating, “Nevermore!”

I anxiously await a day when the Minnesota Vikings next visit our stadium. Will former Bucs quarterback Josh Freeman do the honors at quarterback? Just wondering. Just hoping.

Warner Wood

Temple Terrace

Your choices

Mike Jones’ letter (“Price shock,” Your Views, Oct. 7) is a perfect example of the misconceptions about the Affordable Care Act. His estimates of his basic costs under his Medicare Advantage plan are not correct. He is surprised that his physicians group is not covered under his plan. Medicare Advantage plans have always required that you use doctors in that particular plan’s network. End-stage renal disease is not covered under any conditions.

Jones seems to have subscribed to the “throw grandma (or grandpa) under the bus” myth. What the ACA covers is visits to your physician to make your own end-of-life decisions. It has nothing to do with denying care to the elderly. You make the choices. Lastly, don’t blame Sen. Bill Nelson. Remember when Medicare itself was called the road to socialized medicine?

Marilyn Signer

Lakeland

Mean and petty

Most of the media coverage of the federal government shutdown seems to follow the Democrat template. I am used to that. But it seems to me so obvious that the president and Harry Reid got exactly what they wanted.

The House legally used its constitutional power to offer a continuing resolution. Why a CR? Because the Senate and White House won’t complete any budget process — haven’t done so for five years. Rather than take hard votes on what to spend tax dollars on, thus revealing how much they waste our tax revenues, they choose to just pass continuing resolutions to spend the same amount as the year before, with maybe a 5 percent to 7 percent uplift due to baseline budgeting. That is how you go from $5 trillion in debt to $17 trillion in a few years.

The CR they passed funded every part of the federal government except Obamacare. They left out one program so that it could be discussed openly and in great detail on its merits. It would be wonderful for them to have agreed to the CR, funding all of government, and they would now be talking about just Obamacare, which deserves some discussion.

But sensing a chance to use the fawning U.S. media to beat up on Republicans, Reid and President Obama showed what small people they are. They blocked any discussion except their own. They proudly and publicly insisted they would not negotiate. So now they spend all of their time looking for ways to put pain into the lives of Americans. They wring their hands looking for sob stories that they have created.

It’s not too late to just agree with the original CR. But then that would not allow them to chain our war memorials, not just in D.C. but in France and all over Europe. And they are closing national parks. They also tried to close the Florida Bay. How mean and petty can you get? Imagine if you had flown your father to Normandy and found a sign saying it’s closed.

That is abuse of the power of the office of president. It’s nearing time to discuss what rises to the level of high crimes and misdemeanors. And it’s time to get the CR done and move on to discussing Obamacare. It should be a more robust discussion this time, as the Democrats don’t control both houses of Congress.

Dan Puhr

Tampa

The ‘Repocrats’

It is now time for a third political party. The moderate Democrats and Republicans need to form a “Repocrat Party” and bring some common sense back to Congress. I am old enough to remember when there were four parties — Republican, Democrat, Conservative and Liberal. The Conservative and Liberal parties were known to be radical and were minority parties. Most voters shunned them for their extreme views. The Democrats and Republicans mostly got along by compromising. I believe that most Americans would support this type of government today. The Liberals and Conservatives could not get anyone elected, so they ran as Republican-Conservative or Democrat-Liberal. That led to just two major political parties. Somehow they both hijacked their parties, and now we have extreme left and right wings running their parties.

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